A sports blog by and for Midwest Sports Fans
On Wednesday at 6:30 ET, the 20th-ranked Indiana Hoosiers (17-5, 5-5) head to Ann Arbor to take on the 22nd-ranked Michigan Wolverines (16-6, 6-3) on the Big Ten Network.
As always, Jerod, Ryan, and Andy will be here with another episode of The Assembly Call as soon as the game ends with instant analysis and fan reaction.
No matter what the outcome was Monday night in the BCS National Championship Game, the SEC was going to have one of its members win the title for sixth straight year.
Unless you root for a team in the SEC, then you are ready for someone else from a different conference to hoist the AFCA National Championship Trophy. Monday night’s game featured two teams from the SEC, and after that unentertaining game, most college football fans are ready for the next champion to come from a different conference.
Now that that season is officially over, it is never too early to look ahead at the teams that could end the SEC’s winning streak in the BCS National Title Game in 2013. [Read more...]
Tonight, #12 Indiana (13-1, 1-1) hosts #13 Michigan (12-2, 2-0) at the Assembly Hall in Bloomington. The Hoosiers are coming off a thrilling win over #2 Ohio State on New Year’s Eve, while Michigan has opened up the conference schedule with wins over Penn State and Minnesota.
One of these two teams will take a big step forward in the Big Ten race tonight, and as always The Assembly Call will go live as soon as the final buzzer sounds to provide instant analysis and a forum for live fan reaction.
A number of college basketball bracketologists released updated projections on Tuesday, and while it’s easy to argue the merits of doing this so early, it certainly makes for some interesting discussion and helps gauge where teams stand as conference play gets rolling.
I’ll be releasing my own projections starting next week, but for now I thought it would be worthwhile to look at how Big Ten teams are shaping up with as many as nine of them in some of these mock brackets.
The BCS bowl games are coming up after the New Year’s Day NFL games Sunday, with the Rose Bowl and Fiesta Bowl Monday, the Sugar Bowl on Tuesday, the Orange Bowl and on Wednesday and then the BCS National Championship Game the following Monday, January 9th.
Here is a quick preview of the BCS bowl games with picks and current point spreads.
As a rule, I normally stay away from the BCS bitching.
I, like most – would like to see some sort of playoff system in place. Taking the current four BCS games and making them National Championship quarterfinals (in the end adding two games to the season) to me seems like a logical solution.
To the naked eye, Alabama does appear to be the second-best team in college football, but thanks to one distracted night in Ames, IA a few weeks back, Oklahoma State will never have a chance to prove the case that they were more deserving of the #2 seat.
But college football is spectacular as it is: only 14 precious Saturdays with an entire menu of games available on television (no Sunday Ticket package needed) and mind-boggling finishes the norm on a weekly basis. Sadly, it is all over except the 35 bowl games, then nearly eight long months before the madness returns.
But there is one injustice in the BCS (besides continuing to give the Big East an automatic bid) that indeed will happen and must be pointed out.
Why are the Michigan Wolverines likely headed for the Sugar Bowl while the Michigan State Spartans are headed for the Outback (literally)?
The 13th annual Big Ten/ACC Challenge tips of on Tuesday, and after 10 years of disappointment the Big Ten is looking to extend its own winning streak to three.
For the first time, both leagues have the same number of teams, so there are 12 games on this year’s slate. (In the event of a 6-6 tie, the Big Ten will retain the Commissioner’s Cup in case you were wondering. Spoiler alert: That shouldn’t be an issue.)
Sunday, when the Detroit Lions overcame a 17-point deficit to defeat the Carolina Panthers, American football fans gave thanks four days early.
The 7-3 Lions are relevant on the fourth Thursday of November.
When families across the country tomorrow turn their televisions to Fox at 11:30 a.m. (Central Time), they’ll get to enjoy a Thanksgiving meal while watching a Lions team that is very much in the playoff picture (complete schedule here). Many of my MSF colleagues aren’t old enough to remember the last time that happened.
For the first time in years family members won’t be asking each other, “Why are we stuck with the Lions on Thanksgiving?” as they pass the mashed potatoes.
Last week, Brady Hoke did something Rich Rodriguez never could during his 3-year tenure as Michigan’s head coach – start a season 6-0. This week, Hoke will attempt to succeed again where Rodriguez couldn’t.
Michigan State won all 3 meetings against the Wolverines under Rodriguez, but there is no doubt that this 2011 Michigan team is much different than any the Spartans faced the last 3 years. This rivalry, which many regard as the fiercest in the Big Ten, means a little more this time around for both teams.
East Lansing’s Spartan Stadium will host a battle for first place of the Big Ten’s Legends Division. #11 Michigan (6-0, 2-0 conference) and #23 Michigan State (4-1, 1-0 conference) can each take the inside track to the Big Ten Championship Game with a win this Saturday.
It was another intriguing weekend in sports, especially here in The Midwest where baseball is currently king and a changing of the guard is underway in the Big Ten. Here are 8 things we learned this weekend.
In episode #4 of The Bottoms Line College Hoops Talk Podcast, I am joined once again by Rob Dauster and Troy Machir of Ballin’ Is a Habit.
The three of us discuss Troy’s recent interview with the great Jay Bilas, idiots tweeting crazy stuff at recruits, and previews galore including the Colonial, Mountain West, and West Coast Conferences plus Butler, Fairfield, Long Beach State, Michigan, and more.
The Tinley children are on Fall Break, so we’re spending the week vacationing on Perdido Key. I was without Internet access until yesterday, when I successfully guessed the password for a wireless router in a neighboring condo. A word of advice: If you’re in Florida and your wireless password is “sunshine,” you’re inviting anyone who can pick up your signal to use your Internet.
Anyway, here are some things we learned this week:
Update: It’s a Fab 5 kind of morning here at MSF. Once you get done reading Jon’s take on the Fab5, check out Jerod’s latest photo story entitled The Truce. It features Jalen Rose, Coach K, Grant Hill, and others, and like this article challenges the common perceptions of the latest controversy surrounding the Fab 5.
I am a 24 year-old white male. I grew up smack-dab in the middle of Indiana but have lived in the Deep South for the past seven years.
It would be naive and foolish of me to even pretend that I’ve really “been around the block.” When it comes to culture, I know a little, but I don’t know a lot. When it comes to racism, I have seen my fair share (I live in Charleston, SC), but to be honest, I have never truly experienced it. When it comes to basketball, I know just about everything you could possibly know from 1995 to the present, but I must remain a student of the game to discover what happened before my time.
So when ESPN announced that they were going to broadcast a documentary on the Fab Five, I was pumped. Literally one of my first basketball memories ever was when my dad bought me a basketball from Hardee’s when I was only five years old. It was a “Final Four” basketball and had four logos: Duke, Indiana, Cincinnati, and Michigan. I can still remember looking at the big yellow “M” and my dad telling me that the Fab 5 played for them.
I had heard and read so much about them, but I had never actually SEEN them. SO I made it a point to clear my evening this past Sunday and set up my DVR so that whatever happened, I wouldn’t miss the chance to see the immortal Fab 5.
When it was over, three things stuck out to me:
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Last night, immediately after the brackets were announced, I went about the process of running through my bracket picking system to figure out my official one-and-only bracket. Now that this is out of the way, I can step back a bit from trying to analyze what I think will happen and take a look at what I hope will happen – independent of if it is what I predicted.
One of the most entertaining activities to engage in with a fresh, new bracket is to see all the possible matchups that could reasonably (or unreasonably) materialize. In this post, I run down 10 matchups that I really hope to see happen, and encourage you to share yours as well.
I’ve written about our friends at Alternative Hero before, and I’m writing about them again today because I like the new T-shirt they just released*.
For fans of Michigan football, there hasn’t been much to get excited about lately, but perhaps the Brady Hoke Era can restore the past greatness of Big Blue. If so, then the entire city of Ann Arbor and most of the whole damn state of Michigan will have “Hokeamania”…meaning this shirt will be a must have.
